Kusama: Infinity
Artist Yayoi Kusama and Experts Discuss Her Life And Work
Cast: Yayoi Kusama
Director: Heather Lenz
Running Time: 78 minutes
Synopsis: Now the top-selling female artist in the world, Yayoi Kusama overcame countless odds to bring her radical artistic vision to the world stage. For decades, her work pushed boundaries that often alienated her from her peers and those in power in the art world. Kusama was an underdog with everything stacked against her"the trauma of growing up in Japan during World War II, life in a dysfunctional family that discouraged her creative ambitions, sexism and racism in the art establishment, mental illness in a culture where that was a shame, and eventually growing old and continuing to pursue and be devoted to her art full time. Despite it all, Kusama has endured and has created a legacy of artwork that spans the disciplines of painting, sculpture, installation art, performance art, poetry, and novels. After working as an artist for over six decades, people around the globe are experiencing her Infinity Mirrored Rooms in record numbers, as Kusama continues to create new work every day.
Kusama: Infinity
Release Date: December 26th, 2018
About Yayoi Kusama
Unfolding over several decades, Yayoi Kusama's career has transcended two of the most important art movements of the 20th century: Pop art and Minimalism. Her highly influential work spans paintings, performances, room-sized presentations, outdoor sculptural installations, literary works, films, fashion, design, and interventions, all of which allude at once to microscopic and macroscopic universes. One of the most"if not the most"popular artists in the world, Kusama continues to draw record numbers of visitors to her exhibitions internationally, while photos of her Infinity Mirrored Rooms frequently go viral on social media. Kusama, who is now based in Tokyo, continues tirelessly to create art and participate in exhibitions. In just the past few years, she has presented major shows at prestigious international institutions including the Centre Georges Pompidou, Tate Modern, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the National Centre of Art, Tokyo, and the Hirshhorn Museum. This past year, Kusama opened her own museum in Tokyo with the inaugural exhibition Creation Is a Solitary Pursuit, Love Is What Brings You Closer to Art.
Kusama's Timeline
- Born in Matsumoto City, Nagano Prefecture, Japan, on March 22, 1929.
- She became interested in painting by the age of 10 and used polka dots and repetitive net motifs to create paintings in watercolours, pastels and oils.
- Kusama moved to New York in 1958 after corresponding with the artist Georgia O'Keeffe. She showed large paintings, soft sculptures and environmental sculptures using mirrors and electric lights. The latter were installations similar to the now wildly popular "Infinity Mirror Rooms."
- In the later 1960s, Kusama staged events such as body painting festivals and antiwar demonstrations.
- The film Kusama's Self-Obliteration, which starred Kusama, won a prize at the fourth International Experimental Film Competition in Belgium and the second Maryland Film Festival, and the second prize at the Ann Arbor Film Festival in 1968.
- During the 1960s, Kusama also had exhibitions and staged events in various countries in Europe.
- Kusama returned to Japan in 1973. While continuing to produce and show artwork, she wrote several semi-autobiographical novels. In 1983, the novel "The Hustlers Grotto of Christopher Street" won the tenth Literary Award for New Writers from the monthly magazine Yasei Jidai.
- In 1976, Kusama checked herself into the Seiwa Hospital for the Mentally Ill, where she eventually took up permanent residence. She has been living at the hospital since, by choice. 5 Her studio, where she has continued to produce work since the mid1970s, is a short distance from the hospital in Shinjuku, Tokyo.
- In 1989, Kusama's work was featured in a solo exhibition at the Centre for International Contemporary Arts in New York.
- In 1993, she represented Japan in the 45th Venice Biennale, returning officially to the event she had crashed in 1966 when she set up her installation of 1500 mirror balls on the lawn outside the pavilion and frolicked amongst them in a red leotard.
- In 1994, Kusama began to create outdoor sculptures. They can be seen at places such as the island of Naoshima in Japan, in front of the Matsumoto City Museum of Art in Japan, and in Beverly Hills, California.
- Solo shows in New York won the Best Gallery Show from the International Association of Art Critics in 1995/96 and in 1996/97.
- From 1998 to 1999, a major retrospective of Kusama's works, which opened at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, travelled to the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Walker Art Centre in Minneapolis, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Tokyo.
- In 2000, Kusama won Japan's Minister of Education's Art Encouragement Prize and the Foreign Minister's Commendations. Her solo exhibition that started at Le Consortium in France also travelled to the Maison de la Culture du Japon in Paris, Kunsthallen Brandts Klædefabrik in Denmark, Les Abattoirs in Toulouse, France, Kunsthalle Wien in Vienna, and the Art Sonje Center in Seoul.
- In 2001, Kusama received Japan's Asahi Prize, in 2002 she received the country's Merit Medal, and in 2003 she received the Nagano Governor Prize for the contribution in encouragement of art and culture. - In 2004, her solo exhibition "KUSAMATRIX" opened at Mori Museum in Tokyo and drew 520,000 visitors. In the same year, another solo exhibition opened at The National Museum of Modern Art in Tokyo. In 2005, the exhibition travelled to The National Museum of Modern Art in Kyoto, Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Contemporary Art Museum in Kumamoto, and Matsumoto City Museum of Art.
- In 2006, Kusama received National Lifetime Achievement Awards, the Order of the Rising Sun, and The Praemium Imperiale for painting. - In 2009, Kusama opened an exhibition at Gagosian Gallery in New York City and Los Angeles, Victoria Miro Gallery in London, and Padiglione d'Arte Contemporanea in Milan. She was also honoured as Person of Cultural Merit in Japan.
- In 2010, Kusama opened a solo exhibition and permanent outdoor sculpture at Towada Art Center in Japan. She participated in the Sydney Biennale and Aichi Triennale, and had a solo exhibition at Victoria Miro Gallery in London.
- In 2011, Kusama had a solo exhibition at the Gagosian Gallery in Rome and Victoria Miro Gallery in London. A Europe and North America career retrospective tour opened at the Museo Nacional Centro De Arte Reina Sofia in Madrid and travelled to Centre Pompidou in Paris, the Tate Modern in London, and the Whitney Museum in New York. A solo exhibition also opened at Watari Art Museum in Tokyo.
- In 2012, "Eternity of Eternal Eternity," a solo national traveling shows, opened at the National Museum of Art in Osaka and travelled to The Museum of Modern Art in Saitama, Matsumoto City Museum of Art in Nagano, and Niigata City Art Museum. The following year, it travelled to the Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art and Oita Art Museum and Museum of Art in Japan. Kusama won the Shinjuku Honorary Citizen Award and became a Foreign Honorary Member of The American Academy of Arts and Letters. She also collaborated with Louis Vuitton creative director Marc Jacobs on the "LOUIS VUITTON × YAYOI KUSAMA Collection." - In 2017, "Yayoi Kusama: Infinity Mirrors" opened at the Smithsonian's Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, DC and will travel to five major museums in the US and Canada through 2019. The exhibition celebrates Kusama's 65-year career and features six of Kusama's captivating "Infinity Mirror Rooms" alongside a selection of her other key works, including several paintings from her most recent series "My Eternal Soul." The same year, the Yayoi Kusama Museum opened in Tokyo.
Kusama: Infinity
Release Date: December 26th, 2018
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